So now you’ve been working really hard on being more clear on exactly what your strategy in your business is, and you’d like to go about actually reaching your goals
- with more definition,
- with more clarity,
- and with more focus.
The key to doing that is tactics.
We’re going to talk about…
- What are business tactics?
- How to think about tactics in your business
- and how to approach implementing tactics
These are important tools to aid in your thinking “on” your business to help grow your business to that next level.
What Are Business Tactics?
In the previous video, we talked about Strategy.
That’s the art form, your approach, your viewpoint on where you’re heading with your business.
Tactics are the specific activities to help you achieve that strategy.
They are focused efforts.
It’s not just willy-nilly attempts everywhere. It’s a specific focus.
If strategy is the art side of things, tactics are the science side of things.
So we’ve identified the strategy previously, and now the key is to identify what are the obstacles to that strategy.
How To Think About Tactics In Your Business
And here’s where people get lost, because tactics are plentiful.
If you walk down the business book aisle of your local bookstore, there are thousands of books talking about tactics.
They’re saying
- how you should be using AI,
- how you should be using drip marketing,
- how you should be using pay-per-click ads,
- how you should be doing door knocking.
- etc.
All of these different approaches are things that are tactical in nature.
Identify Your Strategic Obstacles To Choose The Right Tactics
If you don’t have a sales or a marketing problem, you don’t need a prescription to actually solve that particular issue!
So being clear on what your obstacles are helps make sure that the tactics you’re picking are in line with what you need.
If you’re having an incredible employee turnover problem, a managerial issue, or you’re having trouble doing corrective meetings with employees when they’re not following systems, then looking at sales and marketing is totally the wrong tactic for your strategy you’re trying to implement!
The obstacles help define which tactics to focus on, because you CAN’T focus on all of them at once.
The field is way too broad.
Let’s say that you found a couple of key obstacles to your strategy that you know are roadblocks you’re needing help getting past.
What do you do next?
How do you take those next steps to actually implement tactics and thinking about tactics in a clear way to get to that next level?
Implementing Tactical Thinking For Businesses
Well, there are three different approaches to tactics.
- Focusing on NEW tactics.
- Focusing on what IS working.
- Focusing on what’s NOT working.
New Tactics
The new tactics part is where most people get lost.
We get tactic addicted. It’s really a giant dopamine rush to hear about, learn about this new tactic and how exciting it is.
It’ll solve all my problems with zero downsides.
But oftentimes, new tactics shouldn’t really be explored until the existing tactics have been totally dialed in.
The other two approaches should usually come first.
If you’ve totally exhausted all of your other opportunities, or you’re just starting off, and you have no idea, then new tactics is a place to start with.
Begin thinking about what are the potential solutions. How can I categorize those? Which ones have the highest chance of success?
Which one or two do I start off with and put a new one at the end of the list, not the beginning of the list, as it usually is put in people’s minds?
Tactics Already Proven To Work
This to me is the wildest part about being a business owner, as I see so many owners that are doing something that’s working really, really well, and they don’t double down on it.
For example, maybe they have an awesome, awesome lucky record of going to networking events, shaking hands and smiling at people and getting actual clients out of that.
Instead of just doing more and more and more of that, they decide, “well, let me try Facebook ads for a while, and they go in a totally different direction.”
They are giving up their proven advantage of how they show up in person and trading it for scalable digital options which may or may not work.
When looking at tactics, one of the key things is to look at what you’re already doing and see what’s working.
How can you put more energy and effort into that already?
If you’re doing four hours a week in that networking example, and you can do eight hours a week, you probably would double your sales results.
Now eventually you do hit a plateau where more time doesn’t equal more results, or you have limitations because you don’t have that much time to spend.
No problem.
NOW look at a different opportunity.
But I’ve had clients before that are running ad campaigns that are just killing it, and they want to try a whole new channel without maximizing that other one first (which has already proven to work.)
Before you go sort of rolling the wheel of destiny on a “maybe,” double down on what you know is already proven to be working until you hit that ceiling of more input doesn’t actually equal more results.
Notice Which Tactics Aren’t Working For You
The next thing I see is people that are using tactics that have not ever worked for them, but someone told them that it “should have worked”, or that they knew of someone else who it maybe worked for.
It may be yelling at employees, (“make sure that they fear you”), and then they will do what you’ve told them to do.
That is a horrible tactic for most people. (I can’t imagine it being good for anyone.)
But sometimes people keep doing that thing just because that was a pattern they got into when they first became a manager, and they never learned a new tactic.
Or always blaming and claiming that their employees are the problem. “They don’t listen or follow attention to detail”, and not noticing maybe a new approach to tactics. Having clear system, clear training, better ways for corrective actions can really improve that.
So notice what’s not working and stop doing that.
Don’t double down thinking, well if I just yell louder and more aggressively they’ll listen even better. That’s almost never the case.
Avoiding The Pitfalls Of Thinking Tactically On Your Business
So we’re going to avoid getting stuck with the shiny object new tactic syndrome.
We’re going to see what’s already working and do very much more of that.
And then we’re going to see what’s not working that we’re doing, and we’re going to stop doing that to free up more bandwidth to work on some other new tactics that we need to use back in our stable of tactics instead.
That’s a general approach.
It’s really important that you pick carefully which tactics you’re going to be working on in your business, and that you help hone those skills.
Eventually, a tactic that you’ve honed your skill on just becomes part of your day-to-day operations.
It’s how you market, or how you manage, or how you sell things, or how you do your finances. It’s how you manage your time.
Those tactics start off as a new skill you’re learning and this new approach, this new activity to make the approach happen, but pretty soon they just go into the regular day-to-day operations.
Again, the tactic is essentially the specific activity you’re doing to overcome a specific obstacle in the way of your strategy.
Don’t do 17 tactics at once!
Focus on one, maybe two specific tactics that you want to really hone in on, get good on, and then run it like a science experiment.
What’s working?
What’s not working?
What if I change this variable?
What’s my hypothesis of what will happen if I try this tactic?
Run it like science to go underneath the umbrella of the art of the strategy.
I hope that helps. Keep thinking on your business and how to make it the one you want.
Have a good one.
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